


#ifiwasinatimeloop

by nekoma



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, First Kiss, M/M, Mention of Panic Attack, Time Loop, first phanfic haha don't kill me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-19
Updated: 2015-06-19
Packaged: 2018-04-05 04:11:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4165302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nekoma/pseuds/nekoma
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan is stuck in a time loop, and of all the days he could be stuck in, he’s stuck in the day when his best friend kisses him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	#ifiwasinatimeloop

**Author's Note:**

> this is ofc inspired by the #ifiwasinatimeloop hashtag they did for their radio show on 2nd february. also my first phanfic LMAO so i apologise for any errors ok i hope you like it and tysm etc
> 
> also i posted this on my tumblr if it's relevant to anyone: [ here ](http://redplaiddan.tumblr.com/post/110814789363/ifiwasinatimeloop)

_Keplunk!_

Dan jolted awake as a loud sound invaded his dreams. His eyes snapped open, his sudden return to consciousness sending a slight tremor through his body. Searching for the source of his rude awakening that morning, he got up and stared in dismay at the spreading stain on the carpet of his bedroom where an overturned glass now laid, realising that he had accidentally knocked over a glass on his bedside table that was filled with water onto the floor in his sleep.

“Fuck,” Dan swore and flopped back onto his bed in exasperation. Good start to a good day. He’d wanted to sleep in until at least, well, one in the afternoon, considering how incredibly fucking cold it was that morning and the night before. Internet persona AmazingPhil was, indeed, amazing, but especially so at weather predictions. When Phil was jokingly selected as BBC Radio 1’s honorary groundhog –which was ironically in lieu with Phil’s childhood dream to be a weatherman, Dan thought amusingly- and had managed to somehow pop the balloon that contained a hand-drawn snowflake in it, no one actually thought it was going to snow in fucking February.

But here they were. Four days after the radio show, and it was still snowing non-stop throughout the whole day. Granted, it wasn’t like a heavy blizzard but more of a constant-rate snow, but still. The average temperature outside hadn’t exactly allowed the fallen snow to thaw faster than the arrival of more incoming snow. As a result, the streets outside their flat were covered with inches-thick of snow, making it almost impossible to leave the house to get anywhere else. Which was fine with Dan, to be perfectly honest.

He allowed himself to indulge in the warmth of his sheets for another 10 minutes before getting up to pick up the glass and set it on the bedside table. Nothing much to do about the stain, though, might as well let it dry on its own. Besides, it was just water. He had had worse carpet stains that were difficult to get rid of before, but let’s not go there.

After cleaning up and pulling on a fresh T-shirt –his grey Playlist Live shirt because what the heck, Playlist was next week- he headed for the kitchen, bringing the glass along.

“Phil? Phiiiiiil,” Dan bellowed for his best friend slash flatmate, knowing that, asleep or awake, Phil would definitely be able to hear him. He’d forgotten to check his phone for the time after his little spilled water incident but if he had to take a guess, he’d say it was about 11AM late in the morning, and Phil should already be awake by now.

“Yeah?” came a response from the direction of the living room. “I’ve got Shreddies. Waiting for you to watch a movie.” Dan couldn’t help but smile at this. It was true, you know, and not just for show in the day in the life video, that they  _really_  did have an agreed system worked out to watch anime while having breakfast together every morning. They were strong advocates of the act of watching TV while eating; Dan’s grandma paled visibly when Dan told her about this during Christmas two years ago. It was every parent/grandparent’s nightmare. Dan made sure to stay away from that topic at the Christmas dinner table ever since.

“Okay, hang on,” Dan yelled back while preparing some Curiously Cinnamon cereal for himself. It was the last portion of the cereal and he threw the packaging and box away after pouring what was left into his bowl.

Phil was still in his pajamas when Dan stepped into the living room and sat next to Phil on the couch, cereal bowls balanced in both their hands, a skill that they’ve perfected together as flatmates over almost two years.

“What are we watching?” Dan asked, except his mouth was full of cereal so it came out more like “Wadarwewachin?” but Phil understood it perfectly all the same.

“I’m thinking we could watch a Hayao Miyazaki movie from that movie box set you got me for my birthday. You okay with that?”

“Yeah, sure, of course,” Dan scoffed. “You know I got that for you so I can watch it too right?”

“Can’t say I’m surprised. I mean, you practically bought a present for yourself. Most of what’s mine is yours anyway.”

“Mm hm,” Dan chewed his cereal. “Princess Mononoke, then? You said that was the first one you wanted to watch on your birthday.”

He was worried he might have said that too quickly, too rushed. As if he was trying to shift the subject away from whatever Phil just said. And maybe he was. It wasn’t like he did it deliberately; his heart leapt and his palms got sweaty, a natural physical response to adrenaline. The words “most of what’s mine is yours anyway” gave Dan an adrenaline rush: what the hell was up with that?

Dan could act and pretend to himself as much as he liked that he didn’t actually know what was up, but at the end of the day, he would only be lying to himself. He was in love with his best friend, was what’s up. It wasn’t entirely difficult or illogical to bring up the term “love” in his friendship with Phil. He loved Phil, truly he did, and he knew without a doubt that Phil loved him too. But…just how much does that love include? Because he loved Phil as a flatmate, a colleague, a best friend…and maybe much more. When did he start to realise that the knotting feeling in his chest that rose whenever he stared at Phil for too long meant that he wanted to kiss his best friend? When did he start to realise that the sour taste on his tongue whenever he saw Phil hugging someone else meant that he was jealous of his best friend’s attention directed at other people other than himself? There was so visible boundary to his emotions, no label in the timeline of his life that told him: on this day, at this time, you have officially fallen in love with your best friend!

So that was a problem. They’d been best friends for so long, Phil being Dan’s first best friend, in fact, and they knew each other inside out seamlessly that interacting with Phil felt like second nature to Dan. He didn’t even need to think to figure out the right words to say whenever Phil asked for an opinion or even just ordering food off the menu for him. They’d become so accustomed to each other’s presence in their daily lives, it was like they were each other’s orbit. Even when hanging out with other friends, they always stuck to each other’s sides like, well, like a married couple. Phil was kind, creative and the right amount of light that Dan needed in the dark and dusty corners of his existence. The yin to his yang (although technically, yang means light so Phil would be the yang to Dan’s yin but that didn’t seem to roll off his tongue quite as well), if you will. And Dan liked to think he provided the perfect balance for Phil too, although sometimes, especially on his darker days, he wondered if Phil still kept him around as an obligatory luggage and not actually because he was of any use to Phil. On the worst of these days when he couldn’t stand it and brought it up with Phil, Phil would throw a pillow at him and call him “the silliest turnip in the whole wide world” and Dan would feel better after that.

So how much was too much, then? Like, if he were to put his head on Phil’s shoulder as they watched a movie, would that breach some kind of boundary and cause Phil to leap up in fear or worse, disgust? Not that Dan hadn’t done that before, but usually it was a result of one falling asleep on the other’s shoulder because they were always sat next to each other on aeroplanes, trains and even cinema seats (Dan once fell asleep watching the first Hobbit movie in the cinema; Phil said he’d wanted to kick him awake but realised that Dan had literally zero sleep the previous night from editing gaming videos). Dan also didn’t believe that his friendship with Phil was as fragile as to be severely affected by something as trivial as this, but then again, it seemed like uncharted territory in his mind, this notion of being “more than friends”. None of them ever really brought it up as a serious matter except when discussing “Phan” and shippers on the Internet, so honestly, anything could happen. Anything  _bad_  could happen and Dan wasn’t exactly keen to find out exactly what it was. So he never did.

*

Later that afternoon, they filmed a Sims 4 video for their gaming channel. Dan loved filming gaming videos. Besides being absolutely hilarious, he enjoyed watching Phil’s reactions the entire time. If there’s one thing gaming does to you, it’s stripping away all your walls of restriction until you’re a shrieking, raging mess rolling on the floor with your game console clutched in your fist like a triumphant trophy. It strips you bare and shows your true colours; while Dan’s would be a streak of bright red (furious yelling and pressing of buttons until he felt like his fingers would actually fall off), he reckoned Phil’s would be a light blue – an antithesis to Dan’s intense competitiveness. In the midst of Dan’s full concentration to beat Phil in a game, Phil would crack a stupid lame joke and Dan would stop to admire the zero fucks that Phil gave as opposed to his own ten million’s. Of course, The Sims was a lot tamer than, say, Donkey Kong or Tekken, but it was still highly entertaining to be a part of the process in which they quite literally control the life of their metaphorical child. At the end of each session, Dan would feel like he had somehow still been able to learn something new about his best friend.

After Dil’s home extreme makeover, they made him go to work twice (“We  _need_  the money for a bigger TV, Phil. I know we said the penguin TV’s adorable and all but Jesus Christ I don’t think Dil would appreciate watching his cooking shows in 240p and you know that.”), visit the park (“I really want Dil to learn fishing and the last time he fished at the river next to his house he got outsmarted by a bunch of  _fishes_ after we regrettably mounted Susan on the wall. Besides, we need a fish for the new fish aquarium-” “It’s a fish bowl, Phil, a fish  _bowl_.” “-okay, yeah, we need a fish for the new fish bowl.”) and invite Preston over to the house for some cake (“Finally, Preston is worthy of Dil’s attention.” “It’s time for Dil to meet his new official sugar daddy-” “Dan!”)

They ordered pizza for dinner that night. The pizza man was late so they got a free coupon which Phil had somehow managed to lose within five minutes of procuring it.

*

It was about half past one in the morning when Dan heard Phil’s yelp from the toilet. He was in his assigned browsing position and scrolling through Tumblr, when Phil’s high-pitched scream made Dan look up from a Vine of an anteater on his dashboard.

“Phil? Phil! What happened?”

The sound of glass breaking and another yelp.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Dan hurriedly scrambled up from the couch and headed downstairs for the toilet where the source of the sound came from. Phil plus the sound of glass breaking was not a good combo at all.

“Phil! Are you okay?!” Dan almost stepped into the toilet when Phil yelled, “Don’t move!” He was crouching in an awkward stance, one hand gripping the edge of the sink and the other held up towards Dan.

“Phil…are you kidding me.”

“No, seriously, don’t move in case you step on it.”

Phil had broken the huge mirror in the toilet. “Again? Not to be a Debbie downer or anything, Phil, but-” Dan broke off when he noticed red stains on the floor and on Phil’s shirt. “Dude, are you okay? Did you cut yourself?”

“What?” Phil looked down at the stains on the floor and then at his hands. “Oh. Yeah. Oh, no.” His face scrunched up as he attempted to pluck a small shard of mirror glass from his left palm before Dan interjected. “No! No, Phil, don’t do it here, hold on-” Dan picked up the doormat and placed it on the toilet floor in front of Phil. “Get out – step on the mat so you don’t hurt yourself again – get out and get the first aid kit and I’ll clean this place up.”

Phil did as he was told –he was in no position to argue, really, with a bloody hand and all- and Dan retrieved the broom and dustpan from the store room to clean up the broken mirror shards scattered all over the floor, standing on the mat the entire time to avoid stepping on them. He looked at the mirror –or what was left of it- and saw a spiderweb of cracks that originated from a spot at the bottom right side of the mirror where it had obviously been hit with a heavy object. What the hell did Phil do? He couldn’t say he was surprised though, his friend had broken three mirrors in one go once, but what could Phil possibly have thrown at this huge mirror to break it? What the hell, Phil.

Dan returned to the living room to find Phil sitting on the couch, the first aid kit opened and balanced on his lap, yet his left hand was still bleeding and unbandaged. Phil looked up at Dan as he walked in, holding up his palm with the shard still in it. “I can’t get it out! I’m too scared, can you pull it out for me please, Dan?”

“Well, this is only mildly horrifying. I don’t want to get your blood on my hands, figuratively and literally,” but even as he said that, he positioned himself next to Phil on the couch and took Phil’s left hand in his own. A small shard the size of a peanut jutted out of Phil’s skin, a stream of blood flowing from the wound –although thankfully, Phil had already wiped away most of the blood and only left a centimetre radius within the wound untouched. “This is going to hurt a bit. Imagine…imagine a huge furry sheepdog rolling around in the snow-” he yanked out the broken piece of mirror and Phil automatically jerked his hand away with a yelp.

He wrapped the broken shard carefully in tissue paper and threw it away swiftly into the dustbin that Phil had placed next to the couch, filled with red-stained tissues. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Phil examined his hand. “Ugh, it stings.”

“Well, this isn’t even the worse sting yet, we need to get it bandaged up,” Dan took the first aid kit from Phil’s lap and rummaged through it, retrieving a bottle of antiseptic and some bandages. Living with Phil had sort of trained him to be a first aider, or at least the bare minimum of a first aider. Phil was quite literally the clumsiest person he’d ever known, not that Dan was particularly agile himself, but he believed that if he wasn’t with Phil at Hollywood Studios the other day when they got stuck on a roller coaster, Phil would’ve fallen down the 80 feet drop –that was how clumsy Phil could be.

Dan poured some antiseptic onto a cotton wool and dabbed the wound on Phil’s hand carefully.

“Stop moving, Phil-”

“Ah! Sorry, it stings!”

“Well, duh, I’m enjoying this as much as you are,” Dan steadied Phil’s palm and tried to be as gentle as he could, applying as little pressure onto the wound as possible. “What happened?”

“This is going to sound really dumb…”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

“You know the plant I bought last week and placed it next to the sink?”

“How can I forget,” Dan rolled his eyes. While Phil’s houseplant addiction was pretty adorable, he wasn’t going to admit it outright in front of Phil.

“I was holding its vase and like, balancing it on one hand while watering it with a mug with my other hand and I lost balance,” Phil let out a giggle. “I was juggling the vase! I juggled it for five seconds before it hit the mirror and well, yeah. The vase didn’t break though! Miraculously!” Phil piqued up at this, as if not breaking a vase was the strangest thing that had happened to him and didn’t actually cause his hand to bleed.

“Jesus Christ, Phil,” Dan let out a barking laugh. He was still holding Phil’s hand in his left hand, and with his right hand he visibly did an exaggerated facepalm. “You want to know what a miracle is? A miracle is you’re still alive today.”

“Yeah, well, maybe I have you to thank for that.”

He had done it again. Dan averted his gaze from Phil’s eyes and concentrated on wrapping a fresh bandage around his friend’s wound, all the while consciously aware that while he was actively avoiding eye contact with Phil, Phil’s eyes were trained on him the entire time.

Dan swallowed nervously. This sort of scenario wasn’t exactly uncommon throughout their six years of friendship, but somehow, with Phil looming over him so closely that he could feel Phil’s steady breaths against the skin of his arm and him touching Phil’s hand –almost  _caressing_  it, for fuck’s sake- feeling the warmth of Phil’s entire presence –that’s what he was, wasn’t it? Phil made Dan feel warm all over, the kind of warmth that had more to do than the heat from a radiator- on such a fucking cold night, this felt different.

“There, I think you’ve fulfilled your injury quota for the month-” Dan looked up and-

-and Phil leaned forward to kiss him.

As far as Dan’s kissing experience went, he generally classified kisses into two categories: urgent, hot kisses that involved quite a lot of biting, pleas to bring things to the next level, and slow, gentle kisses that almost seemed to be savoury, like watching a very long monochrome film.

This was neither.

This was at first a complete surprise, the spontaneity of the situation and the feeling of Phil’s lips against his sending a tremor down Dan’s spine, not unlike the tremor he had this morning when he was jolted awake from a deep slumber. It was his brain fumbling to discern what the fuck was actually happening and –oh God, oh God, his best friend was kissing him and his heart was beating so fucking fast like a wild bird flying erratically around a cage trying to get out. But Dan didn’t want to get out, his fight or flight responses had kicked in in the face of utter shock, but he wanted to do neither of those things.

What he wanted was to kiss his best friend back. And so he did.

Dan inched closer, his right hand bringing Phil’s face closer to his as he leaned into the kiss. Phil smelled like fresh detergent and tasted like mint toothpaste –how poetic. Still, it was Phil his sensory organs were detecting, so he couldn’t possibly be anything but happy. Some part of him knew that there should be a precedent to this, something they had to talk about, and it was an incessant nagging at the back of his mind but Dan couldn’t bring himself to do anything about it except drink in Phil as much as he could.

Which was why Dan was taken aback –again- but not wholly surprised when Phil pulled away abruptly. They were both breathing heavily, as heavily or perhaps even more so than when they went jogging together. Phil’s cheeks were crimson, a bright spillage of colours across his incredibly pale skin canvas.

“I- sh- I- I’m so sorry, Dan,” Phil started to fidget and stood up suddenly, pulling his bandaged hand from Dan’s grip. He was casting his eyes around wildly, and Dan’s heart sank when he realised that Phil was trying to look anywhere  _but_  at him. “I- I don’t know what got into me. I just had a long day, with the whole…mirror smashing thing,” he let out an unconvincing laugh.

“Phil-”

“I’m tired, I should probably go to bed. You should, too, Dan,” Phil uttered those last few words hurriedly, the quickest and briefest farewell Dan had ever gotten from him, and left the room immediately, as if he couldn’t stand to be around Dan any longer.

And Dan…well, he thought he was going to go fucking mental.

A strong and terrible dread crept upon Dan as he sat on the couch, his posture unmoving, dozens of questions assaulting his mind simultaneously: Did he do something out of bounds? Accidentally said something that was too outrageous? Did he smell? Was it his kissing? Was it just a friendly, platonic peck on the lips that Dan had mistaken as something more and him kissing Phil back had driven him away?

Why the fuck did Phil Lester, his best friend, suddenly leave him?

And he did leave him, didn’t he? All his previous insecurities and doubts now came rolling in like one huge tidal wave. They never really left –they were festering beneath the surface of kind words of reassurances by his best friend, but now that his security blanket –Phil- had been snatched away from him, every single fear he had ever had resurfaced and threatened to pull him under.

Dan felt a headache coming and took a deep breath, determined to not let his thoughts get the better of him that night. There was nothing he could do. Theoretically, he could knock on Phil’s door to demand an explanation, but as much as Dan was burning with curiosity to know  _what the fuck just happened there_ , he also didn’t want to know. He didn’t want to stare into Phil’s strikingly blue eyes as he said it was all just a mistake and it was silly to even be contemplating that they could be more than what they already were and no, Dan couldn’t take that at all. He’d rather jump off his bedroom window than put himself in that vulnerable position, as if he wasn’t already fragile enough.

That night, he thought he’d barely slept at all. But one could only dream when one was asleep, right? And Dan had dreamt of Phil moving out and leaving him all alone.

*

_Keplunk!_

Dan’s eyes opened abruptly at the all too familiar sound of something being knocked onto the floor. He groaned.  _What the fuck? Again? Two days in a row is a bit too much, don’t you think?_  He asked no one in particular as he picked up the glass and set it on the table. Weird. He didn’t remember bringing a glass of water to his room last night-

Last night.

Everything came rushing back to Dan like a sledgehammer to the face. The return of his memories of last night’s events felt like a physical punch in the face, the pain manifesting itself in a growing headache.

Phil had kissed him. And Dan had kissed him back, but only before Phil pulled away and left in a sudden.

“Are you…fucking kidding me…” Dan groaned through his fingers, both his hands forming a barrier covering his face, hoping it was the first step to actually hiding his existence forever.

Given the choice, Dan wouldn’t want to leave his bed at all, but he had things to do. For example, a job. Multiple jobs, in fact. He and Phil had a meeting with Aled at the BBC Radio 1 station later concerning the Internet Takeover special session the next Thursday, and then they had another presenting gig for the BRIT Awards later that night.

He and Phil. Dan and Phil. That was their package deal. Their single entity.

And now he dreaded the thought of even bumping into his best friend at his own flat. This could arguably be the lowest point of his life yet.

He forced himself to get up and change into a T-shirt before walking to the kitchen in trepidation. No sign of Phil thus far. Maybe if he avoided him long enough today, he could pretend that he was actually sick and couldn’t leave the bed and Phil could easily represent him in all the meetings today…

“Dan? Is that you? Are you awake or is it just a burglar shuffling through the kitchen?” Phil’s voice drifted in from the living room and Dan felt his blood go cold all over. And then he realised something. Something didn’t quite click in this scenario.

Phil sounded…well, normal.

He didn’t know how to describe exactly what “normal” was in terms of the Dan and Phil household, but let’s just say that Phil didn’t sound as if he had kissed his best friend last night after his best friend helped to bandage his injured hand, after which he promptly left the scene of crime with no explanation.

“Phil…?” Dan attempted.

“Yeah? I’ve got Shreddies. Waiting for you to watch a movie.”

This time, Dan  _really_  did go cold all over, and it wasn’t just because of the snow. The snow! He darted a quick glance outside the window and caught a glimpse of the inches-thick snow blanketing everything around the flat. Exactly like how it was yesterday.

No, this was stupid.  _He_  was stupid. It snowed consecutively for four days, a fifth day seemed more logical than anything. Phil’s scarily exact response and his cheery tone, however…well, maybe Phil was taking the high road and helping Dan out by forgetting last night had happened. Which was more than fine with Dan.

He shook his head and willed himself to act normal (Dan-and-Phil-household-normal) as he made himself breakfast. He stopped in his tracks, staring at the box of Curiously Cinnamon next to several tin cans of baked beans.

He could’ve sworn he had thrown it away yesterday after he’d finished it…

Dan took an almost involuntary step back, but stopped himself before he started to overthink everything. Since young, his family had a habit of denying something had ever happened if that something was too ridiculous to even ponder about and could never make sense. His aunt had a saying, “If it’s too ridiculous for a newspaper headline and perfect for the plot of a fantasy fictional movie, then don’t waste your time on it”. Not that Dan followed family sayings religiously, but this would be one of those instances when something was off by a little too much and Dan couldn’t figure out how to slide the puzzle piece back into place again.

 _I’m just still disorientated from last night_ , Dan shook his head and settled for a glass of orange juice from the fridge. He cautiously walked to the living room, as if the flat had turned into a minefield overnight. Phil didn’t seem to hate him this morning, and Dan decided to go along with the day and see how it went. He consoled himself with the knowledge that if things started to get out of hand like they did last night, he could always choose to retire to his room. Forever.

Phil was in his pajamas, sitting on the couch, a bowl of cereal in his hand. He looked up and grinned when Dan entered, his gaze falling onto the glass of juice in Dan’s hand. “OJ for breakfast? Really? Who are you?” Phil snickered and patted the seat next to him on the couch.

“I’m thinking we could watch a Hayao Miyazaki movie from that movie box set you got me for my birthday. You okay with that?” Phil said as Dan obeyed and sat next to Phil, but not too close. The uncomfortable feeling in his stomach since he stepped into the kitchen intensified. He took a deep breath and chanced, “We just watched Princess Mononoke yesterday.”

“No, we didn’t,” Phil munched on a mouthful of cereal. “We finished Soul Eater yesterday. But I  _was_  thinking of watching Princess Mononoke today.” He balanced his cereal bowl on the couch arm and placed the DVD into the player, Dan shamelessly staring at his friend all the while, as if doing so might give him the answers to all the questions in his head.

Phil leaned back onto the couch and continued munching on his cereal.

It was too much for Dan.

“Phil,” the finished cereal he could deny. The weird way Phil phrased his words exactly the same way he did the previous morning he could deny. Watching Princess Mononoke he could sort of deny. But he still couldn’t deny last night. “We need to talk about…we need to talk about last night.”

“Hm?” Phil looked up from the TV. “What about it?”

 _What about it? Oh, not much, Phil, just the worst night of my life._ Dan fidgeted until he couldn’t take it anymore and blurted, “You kissed me, Phil! We…kissed. That’s what we need to talk about.”

Phil’s face turned a shade of burgundy. “Wh-what?!” he stuttered. “No, I didn’t! W-we didn’t! What?”

“And then you just said it was a mistake and stood up and-”

“No! No, we didn’t! We- we were at Artusi last night for dinner, remember? With PJ and Bryony?”

Dan furrowed his eyebrows. “No…that was the night before. That was Saturday night.”

“Last night  _was_  Saturday night.”

Beads of sweat started to form on Dan’s forehead and the sour feeling in his stomach immediately transformed into intense nausea. No. It was stupid. It couldn’t be. His life was not an episode of Misfits or whatever.

“What day is it today?” Dan’s voice shrank.

“It’s Sunday…Dan, are you alright?”

“Are you sure you’re not fucking with me, Phil?” Dan reached for his phone and sure enough, his lock screen said  _Sunday, 8 th February 2015_.

“Why would I…? Are you okay, Dan? What’s wrong?”

Dan’s head was starting to spin. Either that, or the flat was the one that was doing the spinning. Either way, he felt like he’d been sucked into a vortex and now he couldn’t figure out if his head was even still connected to his body. He gripped the edges of the couch to keep himself from falling over from the sudden dizzy spell, and when it didn’t alleviate his nausea much, he sprinted for the toilet and threw up into the toilet bowl.

Phil was by his side in seconds, a reassuring hand on his back, constantly muttering, “It’s okay, Dan, calm down, calm down, everything’s alright, nothing’s wrong, let it all out”. Strangely enough, it worked. Actually, it wasn’t too strange; it was Phil, after all. Anyone else would’ve probably just been annoying and ineffective, but Phil’s presence alone made things seem better than it actually was.

Tears were streaming down Dan’s face without him realising it. When he was sure he wasn’t going to projectile vomit on anything or anyone if he loosened his grip on the toilet bowl, he rocked back onto his heels and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

“There’s something I need to tell you, Phil.”

*

Phil handed Dan a mug of steaming hot chocolate before sitting down next to him on the couch.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Phil said. “I’m all ears. Don’t worry about dawdling or rushing. I’m here for you.”

“Thanks,” Dan cleared his throat as his voice broke over the single syllable, sending himself a strong reprimand to not cry in front of his best friend at such an inconvenient moment.

There was a five minute silence during which Dan composed himself as best he could and tried to form the words to explain to Phil what exactly had happened that morning that had turned his world upside down.

“I woke up this morning, and knocked over a glass of water on my bedside table,” Dan began. “The same thing had happened yesterday morning. I mean, not your yesterday but  _my_  yesterday.” Fuck, even that sounded too ridiculous in his own head. And then he remembered something.

“You remember from the radio show last Monday? Our hashtag, if I was in a time loop? A time loop. Yeah. That was what I was looking for. I think I might be in a time loop. Like, waking up and having the previous day repeat itself. Like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day.”

Phil’s confused expression prompted him further. “Yesterday- today. Today, Sunday, February the 8th had already happened to me. I’ve lived through the whole 24 hours of February the 8th…yesterday. For me. Yesterday, I woke up and knocked over a glass of water. This morning, I knocked over the same glass of water. Then I looked outside and it was snowing, like right now. Although that’s arguably debatable but it was that that had planted this seed of thought in my mind in the first place. And then you putting on Princess Mononoke when we had already watched it yesterday –my yesterday- and you saying the exact same words as yesterday and…” Dan was flustered, aware that he looked and sounded exactly like a lunatic at that point. “Am I crazy? Is this what it is? Did all this happen to you too or am I going crazy, Phil?”

“You’re  _not_  going crazy, Dan” Phil said firmly. “You’re in shock, but you’re not losing your mind. But no, I didn’t- I don’t think today was a repeat of yesterday for me? If it helps, my yesterday was us getting Tesco delivery in the morning, then I recorded a video for AmazingPhil, we played Mario Kart for a while and then we had dinner at Artusi with PJ and Bryony, like I said. Are you…are you sure it wasn’t just a dream?”

“No! No, I don’t…think so?” Dan wasn’t even sure anymore. “Like, after this, we’re going to film a Sims video and I know everything that happens in detail and then at night-” he paused. “At night, it was late, after midnight, and you- you smashed a mirror and then, well, and then you kissed me. Okay? We were supposed to talk about that. I don’t even…” he felt like his head would explode at any second. “You believe me, don’t you, Phil? I can’t-”

“Of course, I believe you. I do.” And Dan believed him, too, but he could also sense the minute change in Phil’s tone when he brought up the kiss again.

*

Just to prove to both himself and Phil that he wasn’t making any of this up, Dan insisted they turned on the computer for a Sims 4 video, despite the fact that Phil had protested, saying that they could just scrape the video plan to give Dan headspace for what was happening to him that day. To give Dan “headspace” was to allow him to sink further into the deadly spiral of thoughts and fears and he didn’t think he could handle that ontop of everything that was already happening.

“When Dil goes to work, they’ll ask the choice question again. Whether to microwave or nuke it. Then, the next day he’ll go to the park, because you said that the fishes near his house had outsmarted him before and he needs a fish for his fishbowl,” Dan smiled slightly at the memory. “You said fish aquarium instead of fishbowl and I yelled at you for it. And then we’ll invite Preston over, finally, and I’ll call him Dil’s sugar daddy and you’ll yell at me for that.”

“Well, the thing about the Sims is that it’s not exactly a reliable game when it comes to proving if you’re in a time loop or not, isn’t it? Because you’re the one controlling the Sim. Maybe it would have worked if you hadn’t told me in the first place.”

“You’re probably right. If this time loop continues tomorrow, I’ll let you know.” Dan had meant it jokingly but now the possibility of an endless time loop was dragging him into a deeper existential and time-space crisis.

Phil didn’t fail to notice what was going on with Dan. “You know what? Why don’t we change your today, then? Make it different from your yesterday. Maybe that might break the loop.”

Well, what the hell. Not that he had anything to lose.

They ended up sending Dil to work only once and then went to the gym until his energy bar completely drained out. The next day, Dil went to the bar with Erica Pendleton, where they had a fight and Dil won.

*

They ordered pizza for dinner and sure enough, it also arrived late. Dan told Phil he was going to lose the free coupon they got as compensation and warned him to be careful but Phil lost it anyway.

As he enabled his browsing position after dinner, he found himself bracing himself for the Internet for no apparent reason. He went through the same posts on his Tumblr dashboard as he did during  _his_  last night but he didn’t reblog the posts he did –or would have? The concept of time was now so bizarre that Dan didn’t even want to think about it.

Phil was nowhere to be seen. Dan thought he was probably in his room reading. He’d dropped a subtle hint earlier during dinner (“Phil?” “Yeah?” “Be careful in the toilet later at night.” “What? Why?” “Just be careful and…don’t hurt yourself.” “That sounds ominous…but okay.”) but since he wasn’t a time lord, he couldn’t be sure if it would even work. Or if Phil would even remember.

Dan got antsier as the night approached. He didn’t exactly how the rules of time loops worked, so now that history was changed, now that he had told Phil about what was going on, did that still lead to the same chain of events? What was it called, the butterfly effect? Quite frankly, he didn’t know if he even wanted that night’s events to repeat themselves. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t want to even think about it, but this wasn’t a normal circumstance.

When Phil had kissed him, everything within himself came to life, to put it in the cheesiest way possible. He’d felt his heart soar with elation, at the thought that his hidden feelings for Phil were requited, that the person he loved loved him back. But then Phil had left without an explanation, and that very mere act gave Dan emotional heart cramps. Throughout the entire repeated day, he’d been trying to decipher why Phil had done what he did, and if he could possibly try to figure out Phil’s thoughts throughout the day that led up to that moment when they-

The sound of shattered glass and Phil’s shriek broke his train of thought. His time loop had stuck to its original path despite Dan’s hint.

“Phil!” Dan headed for the toilet, surprised to find his tone laden with concern despite already knowing what had happened to his flatmate.

“Don’t move!” Phil shouted but Dan had already stopped himself by the door. Red stains, shattered mirror pieces; everything was exactly the same. There was something really eerie about seeing a scene that had already happened. Déjà vu itself was already pretty sinister-sounding to be quite honest (during one of his late night Internet scavenges, he’d read that having déjà vus was a symptom of the degradation of your brain) so imagine actually seeing something replay in its whole entirety right in front of your eyes. It sent a slight chill down his spine.

“Are you okay? Did you cut yourself?” he said it out of formality more than anything else, already knowing what Phil’s response would be.

“What? Oh. Yeah. Oh, no.”

Dan picked up the mat just like before and laid it over the broken pieces. “Go get the first aid kit. Step on the mat so you don’t hurt yourself,” he said all this with a peculiar calmness that even aroused Phil’s suspicion.

“Dan…this happened in your yesterday too, didn’t it? That’s why you gave me that weird warning during dinner just now?”

Dan heaved a sigh. “Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, Phil, this isn’t your fault.”

“Okay. It isn’t yours either, you know,” Phil offered him a smile.

Dan returned a watery one. “Go get the fucking first aid kit, you bleeding knob.”

When Phil left, Dan cleaned up the place just like he had done before, all the time his head one huge turmoil of what was going to happen. There was a knot of anxiety in his chest that he couldn’t unravel, and it got harder and harder for him to breathe the more he thought about it.

*

Phil looked up when Dan appeared at the doorway of the living room, stalling.

“I can’t get it out! I’m too scared, can you pull it out for me please, Dan?” his left palm was outstretched, a frown on his face.

Dan took a deep breath and looked away.  _I’m sorry, Phil._ “I can’t. And I don’t think I should. I should…I should probably go to bed,” Dan was the one who was trying very hard to look anywhere but at Phil now. “I’m sure you can do it by yourself. I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

It was like ripping a bandage from a wound, for lack of a better metaphor. Actually, it was rather like that time Louise had helped him wax his legs for his side channel, except this was five hundred percent less fun to do. Both his hands were balled into fists as he walked –almost ran- back to his room despite Phil calling after him to come back, please come back but he couldn’t, he couldn’t bear going through the whole thing again.

His fears jeered and taunted at him, siphoning cruel thoughts into his head, that  _Phil doesn’t need you anymore, you’re nothing more than an emotional baggage holding him down, he deserves someone better than you_  and Dan didn’t want to hear those words actually come out of Phil’s mouth. That would be worse than all the things he’d beaten himself up over throughout their friendship.

Maybe he was wrong. Maybe after going to bed and waking up the next day, everything will revert back to normal and this day hadn’t happened at all and the kiss did happen and he’d wake up facing an awkward situation that he had been prepared for that very day with Phil. Running away now wouldn’t do that much good then, but Dan liked to think that at least if he were to wake up normally the next day, he had a 50/50 chance of actually  _not_  kissing his best friend and that wouldn’t be a crease in their friendship and everything might possibly go back to how it was and he could go back to having hidden feelings for Phil without anyone else knowing.

Because obviously any hope that his feelings might be requited from the kiss was dashed when Phil walked out the door that night.

It was the earliest that Dan had ever went to bed, but he spent the next few hours staring at the ceiling in between tosses and turns, trying to drift off to sleep but his mind was a beehive of noises that wouldn’t shut up no matter what he did. Through the foggy haze of his mind, he could hear Phil walking around the flat and once, he even thought he heard a knock on his door but he wasn’t sure if he had imagined it or it had actually happened.

*

_Keplunk!_

_Son of a motherfucking-_  Not a particularly kind thought to the start the day with, but Dan couldn’t be arsed about that if he was going to have to do this over and over again every single fucking day. And this day! Of all days! The one day when something he  _still_  couldn’t wrap his head around happened to him. If there was a god, he would be laughing at the sitcom that was Dan’s life right now. There was literally no bigger joke other than his current existence, and Dan was already done laughing about 48 hours ago.

He was just really tired, both physically and mentally. Not being able to sleep with beehives for heads for two consecutive nights was taking a toll on him, and even though his body refreshed itself every day, the exhaustion still settled deep within his bones, a psychological deadweight of hopelessness, sadness and anxiety.

 _Okay. Fine. If we’re going to do this again, we’re going to do it_ my _way._

And his way included getting the answers he needed.

*

In the end, he decided on a plan. It wasn’t really a plan, to be truthful, because the “plan” involved doing everything exactly like the first time round. Pretend that nothing happened and he wasn’t thrown into some kind of cosmic error in the time-space continuum.

He tried to remember every single detail of that day: he picked up the overturned glass on the carpet, pulled back the curtain after brushing his teeth, even though he already knew what he was going to see through the window, wore his Playlist Live T-shirt and then headed for the kitchen.

He called for Phil, and Phil’s reply was exactly like how he’d remembered it. His heart gave a small leap at the sound of his voice, but Dan forced himself to remain collected. He still had 12 hours to go. He poured his remaining Curiously Cinnamon into a bowl and chucked the box into the bin.

It was like watching a TV show or a movie, but through the eyes of the main character in a first-person perspective. He couldn’t be passive either, because he couldn’t afford to do –or not do- anything too drastic that might possibly alter the course of history. Of course, judging from what happened his night before, his hypothesis might not be entirely accurate but he wasn’t taking any unnecessary risks. There were times when he caught himself almost answering one of Phil’s questions about the movie when they were watching Princess Mononoke because unbeknownst to Phil, he had already watched it. There was a need for vigilance, because he had to make sure Phil didn’t suspect anything was out of place.

The rest of the day went on as it had the first time around, Dan’s façade of pretence giving him the chance to internally prepare himself for what was going to happen. A few times he found himself trying to subconsciously talk himself out of letting things run its course, that maybe he should just stay in his room –something he should’ve done at the very beginning- and avoid the day like he had the previous night by stomping off into his room, but he also realised he couldn’t bear to see the hurt in Phil’s eyes again and again every time he left him. Because that would just be doing the same thing Phil had done to him. Except he would be doing it repeatedly to Phil without Phil even knowing, but for Dan it would be an accumulation of regret, guilt and sorrow.

He was afraid that Phil might confirm his fears, terrified that Phil might turn him away for good, but waking up to another day of being stuck in this godforsaken day, he didn’t think he had the mental capacity to continue avoiding Phil like he’d initially wanted to. He’d seen the pain in his friend’s eyes last night when he had left, and he could only imagine how lost and confused he must’ve felt, exactly like how  _he_  had felt when Phil had left him. And he couldn’t do that to Phil. He couldn’t do that again and again just to protect his own feelings. Phil deserved more than that.

There was no way either of them could emerge from this unscathed. Unless…unless Dan dealt with his fear and pain head-on instead of running away from them.

If there was any chance at all for Dan to escape from this mess of time and space he was somehow in placed in, then he would need to seek out those answers himself.

*

The second time was both better and worse, as Phil’s lips met Dan’s. His body reacted to it, leaning into the kiss as his breath quickened, but he was also counting down the seconds until Phil would pull away.

“I- sh- I- I’m so sorry, Dan.” To say that it didn’t hurt would be a lie. You can only brace yourself so much for a hit; all the mental calculations you perform might lessen the pain once it lands, but it still lands, so it’s not like you can effectively deflect the attack altogether. Dan knew what was coming, could even describe in detail the positions of their limbs and the colour of Phil’s eyes during that moment from all the thinking he had done for the past two nights, but that didn’t soften the blow much. He still felt the acid in his stomach, the dizziness of being stunned, the shortness of breath from the kiss and anxiety.

But he didn’t allow himself to return to his room to wonder why Phil had done what he did. Instead, he did what he should’ve done on the very first day.

He went after Phil.

Phil had retreated into his room and the door was closed. Dan didn’t know where his newfound courage came from, as his legs felt like heavy lead pieces and all he wanted to do then was hide from the world forever, but he also couldn’t bear the weight anymore, the weight of  _this thing_  that seemed to be tearing them apart at the end of each day. He felt like it would engulf him from inside like a black hole.

“Phil,” he knocked on the door. “Phil, please, talk to me. Don’t shut me out…again,” his words caught in his throat.

There was a torturous period of silence when Dan honestly thought either Phil had gone to bed, or was deliberately ignoring him. Great. His “plan” had already failed before it had even started.

“Phil, you know I’m not moving from this spot until you talk to me,” Dan raised his voice a little to be heard through the barrier that was Phil’s bedroom door. “D’you remember that time you tried to hide the game consoles from me in your room after I beat you at Halo?” He couldn’t help but smile at the fond memory. “This is going to be like that time…but worse. I’ll take a shit right here if I have to.”

The two-minute silence that followed was almost enough to convince Dan that maybe Phil wasn’t going to come out after all, that everything that had happened was indeed a mistake and Dan was wrong, Phil didn’t love him at all, and it was all just a mistake and a mess of hormones and they were two guys living in a flat together for fuck’s sake, this was bound to happen at some point and only Dan was stupid enough to believe that feelings were involved in it.

“Go away, Dan.” Dan’s heart leapt at the sound of Phil’s voice.  

“Not until you talk to me. I can’t…I can’t go to bed without answers anymore.”

Silence. And then-

“I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have done that!” Phil’s voice was muffled through the door but it wasn’t soft, which could only mean that Phil was standing by the door too.

“Why…why shouldn’t you?”

The tension that hung in the air was suffocating. Even though he couldn’t see him, Phil’s presence was prominent and Dan had to remind himself to take deep breaths to avoid a panic attack.

"Because…because I’m in love with you, okay?” There was a pause. Dan imagined Phil inhaling deeply. “My life has never been the same since I met you. I was just starting to figure out the world and then you came along and you got me out of a horrible spot I was in. You made me feel wanted and you were always there when I needed someone, and I always need someone. The best years of my life happened because of you, Dan, and somehow you balance me out. Your presence in my life feels natural like my own breathing, and I want to be with you forever. But I was selfish and I only thought of myself and my needs but not yours. I was greedy, I took what I wanted without even thinking about your feelings or our friendship and that was the most important thing, the most important thing to me in my entire life, our friendship, and I just went ahead and ruined everything all because I was too self-serving and didn’t think about anyone else. Didn’t think about you. Didn’t think about how I could hurt you so badly.”

Phil’s words were like the wipers on a windscreen, clearing the fog that had plagued Dan’s mind for years. And yet the words “because I’m in love with you” replayed in his mind continuously and Dan had to make sure he had really heard those words clearly, and that Phil hadn’t actually said something else like “because I’m in dove with poo” or “because I’m in move with loo”.

“Phil…did you somehow miss the part where I  _kissed you back_?”

Silence again. “That’s what I was afraid of. I was afraid I’d made you kiss me back out of  _obligation_. That I might have confused you and made you do something equally rash.”

Dan could almost laugh. This was what Phil was worried about. This was why he had left him. They were both such massive idiots.

"Phil, I need you to come out now.”

“What?”

“I’m serious. I can’t talk to a door any longer.”

“You’re not…mad?”

“Of course not, you spork. Although I will be if you don’t get your butt out here right now.”

Dan could almost  _feel_  Phil’s hesitation through the door, and then,  _click_.

The door swung open and Phil stood there, his face still red from earlier, his eyes wildly darting around and his hands awkwardly positioned in his jeans pockets which always happened whenever Phil was anxious, Dan knew.

“If you want to pretend this never happened-”

This time, it was Dan who lunged forward.  

He grabbed Phil’s face in both his hands and kissed him fiercely -some might even say passionately although Dan scoffed at the corniness- as if he was drowning and kissing Phil was the only thing keeping him afloat. All the discrete touching, all the jealousy, all the eye-to-eye conversations they’ve had for the past few years which had fermented within Dan in the form of guilty feelings of romance, he tried to convey all of that into the pressure of his lips on Phil’s and his heart skipped a beat when Phil finally kissed him back.

It was everything he’d hoped for and more. He could only think in rapid bursts:  _He likes me! Phil is kissing me back! He feels the same way!_  It felt like 2009 again, when Dan had met Phil for the first time after countless Skype calls, except better and okay, more intense, because he had fallen in love with his best friend.  

Dan didn’t know how long it was until they broke apart, breathless but grinning like two idiots.

“Did that feel like a kiss of  _obligation_  to you, Philip?” Dan smirked, his arms around Phil’s waist.

"Did you- does that mean- uh, are you-” somehow, Phil’s face had gotten redder, and his flustering amused Dan greatly.

“I’ve wanted to do that for a fucking long time now, you dork. But somehow you beat me to it. You win this round,” Dan couldn’t stop grinning. “I didn’t kiss you out of obligation, Phil, God, are you kidding me. I love you, okay, and don’t make me say this twice but I’ve fallen in love with your psychotic eyes and your stupid but adorable mismatched socks and maybe even your cereal thieving habits, but that one’s still up for consideration.” Phil laughed.

“I have never loved anyone the way I’ve loved you for the past seven years, Phil. You gave me something no one, not even myself, could give me. You gave me a sense of security and validation for my entire existence, and I always feel like the best version of myself around you.” Dan looked down at his toes. “You know me, I’m bad at saying this sort of stuff, but you helped me become the confident person that I am today, the person I would’ve wanted to be when I was 15 years old, and I can’t thank you enough for that. And YouTube, the radio show, getting to meet our favourite celebrities, I’m more than glad that I got to do all of them with you. We’ve come so far and I wouldn’t have wanted anyone else by my side. I’d like to be with you forever, too, if that’s okay.”

Phil beamed at him. “You don’t have to say it twice, but I’ll say it to you.”

“Yeah?”

“I love you, Dan.”

“Same.”

Phil whacked him on the arm and Dan laughed before closing the distance between them again by placing his lips on Phil’s.

Dan spent the night with Phil on Phil’s bed, their arms around each other, their legs entangled under the sheets. It wasn’t until Dan was dozing off with an arm wrapped around Phil’s torso that he remembered about his little time loop problem. But he wasn’t too worried. If the next day looped again, he already knew what he had to do.

*

The first thing Dan noticed when he woke up the next morning was the fact that he had lost all senses in his left arm. The second thing he noticed was the absence of a “keplunk”.

He opened his eyes to find himself staring at a ceiling that wasn’t his own. It took him several moments to get his bearings right again -last night was the first night in a while that he had slept well, and thus he woke up groggier than usual. He wasn’t in his room. Nor his bed. And there seemed to be a sleeping corpse next to him. A sleeping corpse in the form of Phil Lester.

The previous night’s events all came back to him in a rush, and Dan couldn’t help but grin. He’d broken the time loop, and Phil was sleeping next to him.

He rolled over and placed his head in the nook of Phil’s neck. He curled up into a ball to compensate for the fact that he was a few inches taller than Phil.  

“Phil,” Dan’s early morning cracked voice permeated the silent cold air as he nudged Phil’s arm. “Phil.”

The corpse stirred. “Hm?”

“What would you do, if you were in a time loop?”

“What?” Phil opened his eyes and blinked once, twice, at Dan. “A time loop? For real?”

“Yeah.”

Phil yawned and stretched. “Dunno. I guess I’d choose to stay like this with you. So it loops on forever.”

Dan considered. “That’s a fucking splendid idea, to be honest.”

“Of course it is, you plank. That’s because it was my idea.” Phil nestled closer to Dan, burying his face in his hair. “Now go back to sleep. God, the sun is shining, which means it’s too early to do anything.”

Dan chuckled, knowing that between the two of them, Dan was the one who wasn’t a morning person, but he could understand where Phil was coming from.

Dan closed his eyes and breathed in Phil’s scent of toothpaste and detergent that still lingered from last night. He really could stay this way forever.


End file.
